Flora and Fauna

Half the fun of going somewhere else is seeing different wildlife.  Here in Scotland, there is quite a lot of wildlife, different and variated.  I can completely understand the magic of fairy pools, mushroom rings, and fanciful tales of elves and ents after really looking at the beauty growing all around.

I think this is a coal tit

I have seen great gnarled trees draped in old man's beard, tiny mushrooms growing atop green spongy moss, secret streams that trickle through the heather, great lumps of lichen covered rocks thrusting up out of the ground.  I even saw an orange mushroom with white polka dots on it!  I kid you not.  It caught my eye lurking under a fern, and there it was.  I half expected to see a fairy perched atop it.

There is also a wealth of wildlife that comes right up to my door.  I have bird feeders right off my deck and spend hours watching the birds bully one another for a turn at the food.  I have identified, I think, a coal tit, and a woodpecker (they aren't hard to identify), but the other birds that frequents the feeder, I have not been able to identify.  I raise the challenge for anyone out there to enlighten me.




In the evenings the deer come to graze right off my deck.  I have seen five at a time all around my cabin. I have tried to photograph them, but due to the angle of the setting sun, they are usually back lit and don't come in clear shooting through the window.  I don't want to scare them away by opening the door.

this is obviously a woodpecker

The brown one I can't identify